Tag Archives: Compilations

The release schedule is definitely hotting up now… lots of cool stuff out today.

Behemoth – I Loved You At Your Darkest

Behemoth’s last album The Satanist is a modern classic so no pressure on them to follow it up. None whatsoever no siree. Reading quite mixed and underwhelming reports about this but I’ll want to hear it for myself anyway, and so will you. I’ve avoided all advance tracks so far cause I just want to hear the whole thing.

Anthrax – State Of Euphoria (Deluxe Edition)

I’ve been on a tremungous Anthrax kick lately so this deluxe edition of the underrated State Of Euphoria will do me nicely. Remastered with era B-Sides, booklet and a bonus disc called “Charlie’s Archive” which is work-in-progress recordings of the album’s songs. Puts you right in the room with the band apparently. Bet Scott Ian ignores you.

Steve Perry – Traces

Whoops, almost forgot this one! The Journey vocal legend returns with this surprise solo album. Been looking forward to this and the single No Erasin’ was great so… yes. Look out for editions with bonus tracks too.

High On Fire – Electric Messiah

Matt Pike’s a busy lad. Not content with the excellent new Sleep album he’s also got a new High On Fire one out too. I’ve got most of this band’s stuff but they’re not a big fave and I slept on their last album. Might give this a go though, cause I feel like Pike is just on form lately… and they’re not on Third Man Records so that’s a plus!

Deathhammer – Chained To Hell

Fun black thrash from Norway. New track Rabid Maniac Force is total Destruction worship which is absolutely fine by me. And tell me you don’t want a copy of this for that cover alone! And it’s not on Third Man Records because Jack White is a pure plum.

Riot – Archives Volume 1: 1976-1981

Amazing looking archival release from High Roller that covers the bands early years with vocalist Guy Speranza. Available as a CD/DVD set or a DLP/DVD set, this features 18 unreleased tracks including pre-Rock City stuff, early versions of Narita tracks and a live show from 1981 on the DVD. Want.

Cirith Ungol – Witch’s Game

The returned Cirith Ungol dropped this superb new song on Bandcamp a wee while back and now’s your chance to get their first new song in 27 years on vinyl. It will also feature a live version of Doomed Planet as the B-side, taken from their performance at Germany’s Hammer of Doom festival in 2017.

And that’s about it for another week. See you next week for more new release bunkum.

The new release bonanza continues… this is an even better release week than last week.

Immortal – Northern Chaos Gods

One of 2018’s major releases here. The black metal giants return with their first album since their split with frontman Abbath. And by the sounds of it, I don’t think anyone will miss him. This is vintage black metal with enough glacial riffing to cover the whole of Blashyrkh with an impenetrable and grim permafrost. Or something like that! It’s great basically, that’s what I’m trying to say.

Bundle with bonus single and signed certificate!

Rotting Christ – Under Our Black Cult

Peaceville cover the Hellenic black metal bands’ early days with this 5CD box set. Covers the bands early demos and also contains the Passage To Arcturo mini-album and also has the albums Thy Mighty Contract and Non Serviam. Throw in a 72 page book and a bundle with The Call 7″ and you’ve got a must-buy. I pre-ordered this the moment I found out about it.

Death – Death By Metal DVD

The great Chuck Schuldiner and his seminal band Death get a welcome and long-overdue documentary feature. As well as covering the man and band, the doc also gets into the early days of the death metal scene too. This is such a fascinating genre, guy and career… I don’t see how this could be anything other than essential viewing.

Mortuary Drape – Necromantic Doom Returns

I’ve been wanting to get into this Italian band for years but it’s quite hard to get their stuff on CD or vinyl. So I can’t possibly pass on this compilation of their first demos. Absolute raw demo sound but you know that sound totally fits necro music like this. Reminds me of a gruffer version of the other big Italian band Death SS. Hopefully more reissues of the early albums will follow.

Lucifer – Lucifer II

I checked out this band’s first album because of the link to Cathedral but I found it quite disappointing. But the band has changed a bit for album No. 2. Now Nicke Andersson of Entombed fame has joined and I’m intrigued again. Sounds like better songs this time around but I’m not totally convinced I could go a whole album. Worth checking out though, might be a dark horse.

Y&T – Earthshaker, Black Tiger and Mean Streak

Three classic Y&T albums get the Rock Candy treatment. It doesn’t look like there’s bonus tracks here though, just the label’s usual quality remastering and liner notes. Got these albums on vinyl and CD already so can’t see me being tempted by these. But if you like fun, catchy meat-and-potatoes LA hard rawk then look no further!

And that’s the lot for me, tons of great stuff coming out lately. What are you going to be buying or checking out today?

I’m long overdue doing one of these so I’m going to rattle through the key purchases from the last couple of months… and a bit.

Let’s start with the most recent new arrivals. The just-released expanded edition of Sepultura’s Arise follows similar reissues of Chaos A.D. and Roots from last year and like those it’s stuffed with extras! Rough mixes, demos and live tracks galore. Love/Hate’s Wasted In America gets the Rock Candy treatment. It’s an album I’ve wanted for ages but my first listen is a bit disappointing. Prefer the sleaze bludgeon of their debut Blackout In The Red Room. Ah well, might be a grower. I’ve only listened to the first half of Rotting Christ’s 2LP early days comp Abyssic Black Metal but it hit the spot. I’m really into these guys lately.

On the new album front, we’ve got Voices superb and sexy Frightened, Sleep’s The Sciences on CD at last(!) and the deluxe version of Ihsahn’s killer new album Ámr (worth getting for the great bonus track). All three are album of the year contenders. And I also bought Ghost’s Prequelle which… isn’t. Still pretty decent though.

I got a couple of live CD/DVD combos. Dokken’s reunion gigs captured for posterity on the flawed but entertaining Return To The East Live and Behemoth’s Messe Noire which has two gigs on DVD, promo vids and The Satanist album live on CD. It’s not flawed in the slightest, great stuff.

Def Leppard’s CD Collection: Volume 1 next. Very cool set, much along the design lines of the recent Bowie sets but with less text in the book and less rare material. But then it was also about half the price! Bought mainly for the remastered On Through The Night and the CD debut of some early singles and because… Def Leppard.

Also on the box set front there’s Marduk’s Dark Endless 25th Anniversary Edition. Nice reissue of the strong debut album with a neat digipak of the Here’s No Peace EP with demo artwork from deceased Mayhem vocalist Dead. Also has some stickers which doesn’t really seem very black metal to me. Shouldn’t it just have a dead rat in it or something like that?

On the reissue front I bought the “Final Kill” edition of Megadeth’s classic debut Killing Is My Business… And Business Is Good! which sounds genuinely amazing! Sadly the CD design is clearly just an impossible-to-read transfer of the vinyl design because CD buyers and their pesky money don’t matter anymore. I’m well chuffed with the deluxe editions of hard rock pioneers Montrose’s S/T debut and Paper Money: great remasters, interesting (and readable!) liner notes and tons of bonus tracks.

I’m a big fan of The Who and got a few great additions to my collection recently. Live At Fillmore East 1968 is a brilliant concert recording: fiery performance, some lesser-heard tracks and an epic My Generation to close it out. Pete Townshend’s Who Came First gets some added rarities and is very nicely packaged for the price. And last, but not least, I bought a vinyl reissue of the comp Meaty, Beaty, Big And Bouncy. An odd one cause there’s nothing on there I don’t have already but it’s a bit of Who history with one of those perfect tracklistings… I had to get it eventually and it’s just fantastic! Classic after classic, it sounds phenomenal and I can’t stop listening to it. Highly recommended!

And I reckon that’s about the lot! I’ll try and do this more regularly so I can get into more detail and put up more photos in future.

Time for me to rake through today’s new releases. Some great stuff out today!

Memoriam – For the Fallen

There’s a justifiable buzz about this one. The band’s pedigree (Memoriam feature former members of Bolt Thrower, Benediction and Sacrilege) and a couple of excellent demo singles mean the expectations are high for the band’s debut full-length. Old-school death metal with crusty attitude, weapon-grade riffing and a conscience. I’ll be surprised if anyone’s disappointed by this.

Pallbearer – Heartless

And speaking of buzz… These Arkansas doom-mongers have been enjoying plenty of critical praise in recent years and, judging by the reviews so far, it looks like their critical cache is only going to increase with this, their third album. Fans of extra tracks will want to check out the Japanese edition as it has an extra disc with three bonus tunes on it.

Me and that Man – Songs of Love and Death

And another biggie! Fresh from blowing everyone away with The Satanist, Behemoth’s Nergal is back but, this time, he’s teaming up with guitarist John Porter for this new project. Dark, rootsy music along the lines of Johnny Cash and Nick Cave, I was prepared for this to just not be my cup of tea but I’ve really enjoyed the few songs I’ve heard so far. Intriguing.

Michael Schenker Group – Michael Schenker Fest Live CD/DVD

I was about to knock this into the “elsewhere” category but, on closer inspection, this looks like good fun. It’s a MSG reunion in Tokyo, the Schenk joined by the wonderful Chris Glen/Ted McKenna rhythm section and the trio of vocalists Graham Bonnet, Robin McAuley and Gary Barden along coming along for the ride. Can’t argue with a roster like that! And it’s good to see Michael back on form and enjoying himself.

Samson – The Polydor Years

Samson are mostly known for featuring a pre-Maiden Bruce Bruce on vocals but the talented guitarist Paul Samson kept the band going after the Air Raid Siren’s departure. This new package features the two albums (Before the Storm and Don’t Get Even, Get Mad) they made with replacement vocalist Nicky Moore with tons of bonus tracks. Both albums have been hard, if not impossible, to find on CD so this is a very welcome set.

Blood Divisions – Cardinal One EP

This is an all-star digital-only EP led by Chris Jericho with all proceeds going to Rock and Rescue. They get kudos for choosing two Nasty Savage covers as well as UFO’s awesome Hot N’ Ready (and their single had Scorpions’ Top of the Bill on it too which is another brilliant choice) Two new tracks seal the deal. Fun for fans of Jericho/Fozzy… and it’s all for charidee.

Anthrax – For All Kings (7″ Vinyl Box)

Yet another new edition of Anthrax’s new album, still getting milked to death before people move on. This box has the album divided up into ten singles for… reasons. Does look pretty cool, I suppose.

Elsewhere, Frontiers (who else?) bring out a couple of releases from veteran AOR acts. House of Lords with Saint of the Lost Souls and Night Ranger with Don’t Let Up. There’s another Metal Blade release: Cut Up with their Wherever They May Rot album. It might surprise you to find out that this is a death metal album. Throw in a deluxe, bonus track-strewn 20th Anniversary Edition of Today Is The Day’s Temple of the Morning Star and that’s quite enough for one day! Please note, this isn’t an exhaustive list: just the stuff that stands out for me as being interesting or notable. If there’s anything you are into that’s not covered here then let us all know in the comments. Until next week… happy hunting.

It’s Friday! Apologies for the slightly late posting (just back from holiday) so, without further ado, let’s check out my pick of the new releases… and play the “which album has the best cover” game.

Fen – Winter

Just as we start to feel spring in the air, along come Fen with their new album Winter. Typical, miserable black metallers! I’ll let them off though cause this is one of the more exciting new black metal albums in a wee while. It’s going to be a long one with some epic song lengths, rarely a good sign these days, but the advance word is good and what I’ve heard so far sounded fresh and impressive.

Temptation’s Wings – Skulthor Ebonblade

If that cover, album title and song titles like Lair of the Gorgon Queen don’t sell this to you then nothing will. And the music on this concept album is pretty good too. A sludgy take on true metal, this is one for fans of Grand Magus. And if, like me, you’re finding Grand Magus a bit too mild-mannered these days then this fantasy epic will be well up your cobbled street.

Darkest Hour – Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora

Darkest Hour are getting a lot of rave coverage for their latest album and it hits the shelves today. I honestly just can’t stick this stuff myself though so can’t tell you if it’s better, worse or indifferent compared to their other albums or albums of its ilk. It’s just not my style. But if it’s yours then, by all accounts, you’re in for a big treat. Lucky you!

Havok – Conformicide

If the recent Nightmare Logic from Power Trip wasn’t enough to satisfy your retro-thrash lust, here’s Havok with their new album. I’m a hard-sell for this kinda stuff but the new song Intention to Deceive sounded decent and had good vocals. If you’ve wore out all your Death Angel albums you could do worse than look into this.

Chickenfoot – Best + Live

No prizes for guessing what’s on this album then? I’ve never been convinced by this “supergroup” and their new track Divine Termination isn’t winning me over. So I’ll pass. It’s all a bit too stodgy and smug for my liking. I’ll take The Waboritas over this lot any day.

In the elsewhere file there’s a new black metal from Cirith Gorgor who follow up their recent album Visions of Exalted Lucifer with a new EP Bi Den Dode Hant. Not a band that’s grabbed me one way or the other though. And there’s Evocation who I’m not that fussed about either, but I’ve quite liked some new songs of theirs so their latest album The Shadow Archetype might be a dark horse. And I wanted to mention the new Weigedood album De Doden Hebben Het Goed II. It looks to me like it’s out today but might also already be out in some places too… not sure… but I like the sound of it at any rate. Reminds me of why I got into black metal in the first place so, regardless of whether it’s out today or out already, it’s getting checked out.

**UPDATE** Thanks to Bop at Boppin’s Blog for the head’s up about this – Voivod have announced a PledgeMusic offer for the upcoming reissues of Killing Technology, Dimension Hatross & Rrröööaaarrr. There are vinyl versions available and you can also get 2CD/DVD editions which will have loads of extra live tracks, footage and demos. And there’s also a 2CD comp from this era as well as all the fancy stuff like test pressings etc… It’s all part of the exciting Noise Lebt! series I posted about a while back. The prices look very reasonable and include shipping too. Get pledging here.

Not a banner week like some we’ve had recently but still some decent and intriguing stuff for genre fans. As always let me know what I’ve missed and, until next week… happy hunting.

Cynic’s 1993 debut album Focus is the stuff of giddy prog tech wonderfulness. But there has always been grumblings of discontent among death metal fans who feel that the debut album was a disappointment compared to the band’s earlier demos. I’ll be able to make my own mind up now, as the pre-Focus demos get this official release. The CD version looks great but the vinyl edition is particularly snazzy, and has the CD and a 7″ with it too, so that’s the one I’ve pre-ordered.

Overkill – The Grinding Wheel

Following the return of Kreator last week, the thrash good-times continue with the return of New Jersey veterans Overkill. Actually, of the classic thrash acts, Overkill are one of the few that just never caught on with me. So I’ll probably pass on this myself… I’d rather try some older albums again than hop on here. But if you’re up for buying this, the limited edition CD and vinyl versions have a bonus track, Emerald… I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that’s a Lizzy cover?

Nidingr – The High Heat Licks Against Heaven

I’ve never heard these Norwegian black metallers but I know the name through (their guitarist) Teloch’s involvement with Mayhem and their last album Estoteric Warfare. He was the main writer for that impressive album so if you enjoyed his work with Mayhem, this should be worth looking into. And I love that title.

Mayhem – Live in Zeitz

Speaking of Mayhem! This old live recording was recently featured as a bonus disc with the Live in Leipzig reissue. But then a version taken from a better source was released very soon afterwards as a standalone vinyl edition with new liner notes and packaging. I was more than a little annoyed at this so I didn’t buy the vinyl. But now this cheaper CD version is hitting the shops so I think I might finally upgrade. No doubt, they’ll find an even better version down the back of the couch next week.

Sleep – The Clarity

Not strictly a “new” Sleep song as it was available as a free download a couple of years ago on the Adult Swim site. But here it is on 12″ vinyl. I’ve never been a big Sleep fan but this is a great track and it’s well worth getting if you don’t have the song already and/or love vinyl. Just the one side of music here but the B-Side will have a, no doubt suitably cosmic, etching.

Def Leppard – And There Will Be a Next Time: Live from Detroit

And finally, we’ve got Def Leppard’s new live DVD/BR/CD combo And There Will Be a Next Time: Live from Detroit. I’d normally be a sucker for some live Lep but after Mirrorball and Viva! Hysteria made little impact, not to mention their dicey self-titled album, I can’t work up any enthusiasm for this. Arm no geddon it.

And that’s quite enough for one week, thank you very much! Happy hunting.

Well, this won’t take long. It’s pretty slim pickings today but there are a still a couple of releases worth getting into a big flap about.

Various Artists – Speed Kills VII

Not content with coming back from the dead, the re-animated Music for Nations label has also decided to resurrect the classic compilation series Speed Kills with this long-overdue seventh instalment. The devils! This is going to be an absolute rager. The highlights for me are the first official releases of new songs from The King is Blind, Akercocke and Voices. Fucking YES. And then there’s a track from the very promising Formicarius, a recent Acid Reign track… and if the other stuff here is considered equal in quality to that lot then this is sure to be totally essential. Liner notes from Malcolm Dome too! What’s not to like about all of this?

Trivium – Ember To Inferno: Ab Initio

Was never a massive fan of Matt Heafy and co. but, as the shouty verse/catchy chorus genre goes, they’ve definitely had their moments. Here’s a new reissue of their now hard-to-find debut album Embers to Inferno, which I’ve never heard. There are vanilla versions on CD and vinyl but the smart money should go on the deluxe versions (also on CD and vinyl and sub-titled Ab Initio) which will come with 13 pre-album demo tracks. I’ve not followed Trivium’s recent career since 2008’s Shogun but this look at their early days is intriguing.

KISS – Buenos Aires 1994: The Argentinian Broadcast

There’s quite a few of these radio broadcast CDs out today. Unofficial releases featuring the usual suspects like Rush, Cheap Trick and this one from KISS: a 2CD set of an excellent Revenge-era show. The band headlining a Monsters of Rock festival and pulling out a crowd-pleasing 70s-heavy set. Great sound quality and some absolutely storming renditions of tracks like I Stole Your Love and Parasite. Bootleg-hunters will have this already but I’m late to that game so I’m quite happy to get this on CD.

And that’s us! Not a great deal happening but the Speed Kills VII and Trivium reissue are both strong releases. And there’s the new Stones album but, if that’s your thing, you don’t need me to tell you about it.

As always, let me know what I’ve missed (there must have been something this week, surely?) and happy hunting!